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Desire then is the invasion of the whole self by the wish, which, as it invades, sets going more and more of the psychical processes; but at the same time, so long as it remains desire, does not succeed in getting possession of the self.

Samuel Alexander
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It is convenient to distinguish the two kinds of experience which have thus been described, the experienc-ing and the experienc-ed, by technical words.
Samuel Alexander
We cannot therefore say that mental acts contain a cognitive as well as a conative element.
Samuel Alexander
Psychology is the science of the act of experiencing, and deals with the whole system of such acts as they make up mental life.
Samuel Alexander
But though cognition is not an element of mental action, nor even in any real sense of the word an aspect of it, the distinction of cognition and conation has if properly defined a definite value.
Samuel Alexander
An expectation is a future object, recognised as belonging to me.
Samuel Alexander
Both expectations and memories are more than mere images founded on previous experience.
Samuel Alexander
The mental act of sensation which issues in reflex movement is so simple as to defy analysis.
Samuel Alexander
It may be added, to prevent misunderstanding, that when I speak of contemplated objects in this last phrase as objects of contemplation, the act of contemplation itself is of course an enjoyment.
Samuel Alexander
In the perception of a tree we can distinguish the act of experiencing, or perceiving, from the thing experienced, or perceived.
Samuel Alexander
The interval between a cold expectation and a warm desire may be filled by expectations of varying degrees of warmth or by desires of varying degrees of coldness.
Samuel Alexander
Thus the same object may supply a practical perception to one person and a speculative one to another, or the same person may perceive it partly practically and partly speculatively.
Samuel Alexander
The perceptive act is a reaction of the mind upon the object of which it is the perception.
Samuel Alexander
When we come to images or memories or thoughts, speculation, while always closely related to practice, is more explicit, and it is in fact not immediately obvious that such processes can be described in any sense as practical.
Samuel Alexander
What is the meaning of the togetherness of the perceiving mind, in that peculiar modification of perceiving which makes it perceive not a star but a tree, and the tree itself, is a problem for philosophy.
Samuel Alexander
It is more difficult to designate this form of conation on its practical side by a satisfactory name.
Samuel Alexander
The sensory acts are accordingly distinguished by their objects.
Samuel Alexander
Curiosity begins as an act of tearing to pieces or analysis.
Samuel Alexander
Such being the nature of mental life, the business of psychology is primarily to describe in detail the various forms which attention or conation assumes upon the different levels of that life.
Samuel Alexander
Hence, in desiring, the more the enjoyment is delayed, the more fancy begins to weave about the object images of future fruition, and to clothe the desired object with properties calculated to inflame the impulse.
Samuel Alexander
But unfortunately Locke treated ideas of reflection as if they were another class of objects of contemplation beside ideas of sensation.
Samuel Alexander
An object is not first imagined or thought about and then expected or willed, but in being actively expected it is imagined as future and in being willed it is thought.
Samuel Alexander
Mental life is indeed practical through and through. It begins in practice and it ends in practice.
Samuel Alexander
The thing of which the act of perception is the perception is experienced as something not mental.
Samuel Alexander
You can mark in desire the rising of the tide, as the appetite more and more invades the personality, appealing, as it does, not merely to the sensory side of the self, but to its ideal components as well.
Samuel Alexander
Desire then is the invasion of the whole self by the wish, which, as it invades, sets going more and more of the psychical processes; but at the same time, so long as it remains desire, does not succeed in getting possession of the self.
Samuel Alexander
For psychological purposes the most important differences in conation are those in virtue of which the object is revealed as sensed or perceived or imaged or remembered or thought.
Samuel Alexander
The desire for liberty has also made itself felt as struggle against domestic tyranny or arbitrary rule.
Emily Greene Balch
I want the municipality to be a helping hand to the man with a desire of sympathy, to help the fallen when it is not in their power to help themselves.
John Burns
A desire to be observed, considered, esteemed, praised, beloved, and admired by his fellows is one of the earliest as well as the keenest dispositions discovered in the heart of man.
John Adams
We have no desire to convince anyone that there is only one way by which faith can be acquired.
William Griffith Wilson
But the deep desire for peace remained with the American people.
Paul Robeson
I have known more men destroyed by the desire to have wife and child and to keep them in comfort than I have seen destroyed by drink and harlots.
William Butler Yeats
It was also during my tenure of office that the Japanese Government agreed to the conclusion of a Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and signed it, pursuing a policy in harmony with the avowed desire of the people.
Eisaku Sato
'Tis very certain the desire of life prolongs it.
Lord Byron
One of the things that has always motivated me to write is the desire to get it out and look at it in an objective way, so that it doesn't cause me any serious pain by staying inside.
Carly Simon
In human history, the desire for revenge and the desire for loot have often been closely associated.
John McCarthy
I see Canada as a country torn between a very northern, rather extraordinary, mystical spirit which it fears and its desire to present itself to the world as a Scotch banker.
Robertson Davies
To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition, the end to which every enterprise and labor tends, and of which every desire prompts the prosecution.
Samuel Johnson
The genius of the economic machine is in its ability to convert these indulgences into profitability. It converts desire into attention, a grip on our eyeballs and eardrums, which in turn can be marketed to advertisers.
Todd Gitlin
I don't know what keeps me going. Sometimes I wonder... I think it's just pure perseverance and wanting to succeed and having that burning desire to always have success.
Tanya Tucker
If history and science have taught us anything, it is that passion and desire are not the same as truth.
E. O. Wilson
It's a great mistake, I think, to put children off with falsehoods and nonsense, when their growing powers of observation and discrimination excite in them a desire to know about things.
Anne Sullivan
Let not a man do what his sense of right bids him not to do, nor desire what it forbids him to desire. This is sufficient. The skillful artist will not alter his measures for the sake of a stupid workman.
Mencius
I was interested in telescopes and the way they worked because I had an intense desire to see what things looked like, so I learned how to use telescopes and find things in the sky.
Clyde Tombaugh
When you do portraits professionally it's not a desire, it's for money.
Imogen Cunningham
My desire, my passion, was to help moms with practical encouragement.
Lisa Whelchel
Sometimes I'm uncomfortable with the level of fame I've got! It all depends on the day and what's going on. I don't desire any more fame. I don't need it.
Philip Seymour Hoffman
This life is a hospital in which every patient is possessed with a desire to change his bed.
Charles Baudelaire